Chapter the 35th
“Come on,” Roger prompted Sheila.
Making sure she had a good grip on the candle, Sheila let Roger help her off the train. The sound of cheers and the excited waves from several beat-up choirboys made Sheila think that she and her friends were receiving a hero’s welcome, but the screams and yelling of many others told her there was trouble. A low growl from close by drew Sheila’s attention to Fenrir backed against the train by a ring of policemen brandishing their belly clubs wit Chief McAlister in the lead. Nigel and Edmund rushed up to the wolf and wrapped their arms around the wolf’s neck.
“Don’t let it get away!” the police chief barked through his megaphone.
“Don’t you dare hurt him!” cried Edmund.
“Keep out of this, Kid,” said the policeman.
“Step back and let this wolf through,” Nigel pleaded. “He’s got to finish his quest.”
“I told you to keep out of this and let me do my work,” the police chief repeated.
“But you have to let Fenrir do his work,” Edmund insisted.
“We can’t let a wolf run loose in this town no matter who he works for,” said the police chief.
“How would you like to have your liver ripped out?” roared a pirate who had a black patch over his eye.
“Let me out!” ordered King Perezvon XXVI, breathing down Sheila’s neck. “I’ll settle this.”
“”I’ll help you get off,” Roger offered.
With Roger’s help, the king jumped off the train and made a beeline to the policemen surrounding Fenrir. The phoenix was circling the area just above Sheila, his wings outstretched like a hawk’s.
“I, King Perezvon XXVI, invoke my authority as the one and true and only legitimate sovereign ruler of the Kingdom of Carelin,” the king announced. “On those grounds, I hereby order you to withdraw your bodily presences from Fenrir, the light-bearing wolf, so that he can fulfill his lawful mission.”
“Look it, King,” Everett McAlister replied. “I’m tired of all this royal interference around here, so let’s get this straight: you’ve got no authority in the town of Milton and I, as chief of the fraternal order of police, do have the authority and responsibility of protecting the citizens of this town from the predations of this wolf.”
“Nobody has the authority to attack Fenrir!” yelled Prince Moroch.
“Ah! the Crown Prince speaks sense!” exclaimed the king as medal-studded son ran up to the king.
“This boy has been making enough preposterous claims to royalty to get himself committed for life as soon as I have the time to cart him away,” complained the police chief.
“He’s committed to being my successor in the royal line of Carelin if he can manage to outlive me,” said the King, putting an arm around the boy’s shoulder.
“Speaking of authority,” said Mona as she stepped up to the other side of her father, “I see the Byrd & Tallis over here, which tavern is a tavern in Carelin. And over there, I see Taverner & Tye’s, which is a store in Carelin. So, it seems to me that if taverns and stores of Carelin are here than my father, His Majesty Perezvon XXVI is the king here.”
“Here! Here!” cried the pirates, choirboys, and the militia from Carelin.
“However, as I look about,” said the police chief, “I see Donna’s Donuts and Miller’s Pharmacy and those stores belong to Milton. Therefore you must obey my authority!”
“Yea!” Yea!” cried a number of people of Milton.
The phoenix dropped his flight close to Sheila and seemed to beckon her to follow.
“And I suppose this train station belongs to your town?” asked Perezvon XXVI.
“I’m not going to allow you to take over this town just because you put up a train station without due authorization from the city council!” yelled the police chief, his voice turning hoarse.
“This is ridiculous!” Ted Sloane through his teeth from the door of the train. “McAlister! I order you—“
But the mayor’s words were lost when the phoenix dive bombed the police chief on the head and all semblance of social order disintegrated. Fenrir bolted through the weakened police circle to the lighthouse. A red-haired woman opened the door to let him in. The phoenix swung back and landed in front of Sheila.
“Get on!” Roger urged her.
“What for?” a bewildered Sheila asked.
“Because the phoenix is waiting for you,” said Samantha.
“I’ll bet he wants to fly you up to the top of the lighthouse,” said Scott.
“WHAT!” Sheila yelled.
“You heard him,” Roger urged her. “Hurry!”
“I can’t!” Sheila replied.
“Yes, you can,” said Roger, “you have to.”
“I’ll help you,” said Scott.
He gently maneuvered Sheila on to the phoenix’s back, but the feathers burned her fingers.
“Ow!” cried Sheila.
“Don’t mind the flames,” said Scott. “They won’t burn you too much. Hang on just above the neck. That should do it.”
Sheila had only begun to get a grip on the phoenix’s neck with one hand and clasp the candle to her chest with the other when the phoenix took off. From her bird’s eye view of the confusion, she recognized her parents.
“SHEILA!” cried her mother.
“MY LITTLE GIRL!” cried her father.
Sheila waved at them, but then realized that they were rushing to Amarilla, who was carrying the pink toy piano.
“THAT’S MY GIRL!” cried the red-haired woman as she made a dash for Amarilla.
“What are you doing with the toy piano that I gave to my daughter?” Sheila heard her father ask Amarilla just as she was being flown out of hearing range.
“NO-O-O-O!” a boy’s voice cried out above all other outcries.
To her horror, Sheila saw a man aim a pistol straight at her. Before she could cry out herself, Roger jumped the gunman. A shot rang out.
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The ear-piercing cry made the phoenix buckle in the air. He twisted around and saw a boy jump a man right just as a gun went off. Blood poured out of the boy’s head. His passenger pinched his neck. Not that he could hardly blame her.
“ROGER!” cried Aunt Edith.
A split second later, Roger’s family was bent over the boy and a gang of pirates had the gunman pinned to the street.
“You must avenge your friend,” the older man whispered into the phoenix’s ear.
The phoenix did not need any prompting to swoop down and peck the man’s eyes out.
“He shot your friend in cold blood,” said the woman.
The phoenix had a bead on the murderer. He could already taste the man’s eyes.
“Nothing matters but revenge,” said the younger man.
“NO-O-O-O!” Roger screamed just as he closed in on the kill. Ignoring the blood streaming from his head, Roger, desperately waved him off and pointed back to the lighthouse. The phoenix swooped back up, remembering that something else did mattered much more than revenge to Roger. It was his job to carry the spark to its destination and he would do it for Roger. More gunshots rang out. The gang of outlaws rode their unicorns into the fray, boarded the caboose and emerged with a mail bag each. Then the unicorns galloped over to the lighthouse. The phoenix surged up to the tower. A glowing white rose rested inside a broken light socket and a wolf waited for him, looking up at him with his yellow eyes.
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After being just a spark for so long, Shawn had trouble adjusting to being a real body with something solid supporting his buttocks and something else supporting his back. Under the pressure of a harsh light, he tried opening his eyes, but it was too much and he closed them again. His head felt weird, as if some gears inside were spinning out of control. For the longest time, he had been trapped in the beak of an awful bird who suddenly dropped him on to a soft surface where he exploded. That was the only word he had for it. He exploded. Then next thing he knew, he was lying on a hard surface, most likely in a dungeon.
“Nice going,” said somebody, another male teenager, Shawn guessed. “You did a great job.”
Were those words being spoken to him? That didn’t seem possible. For as long as Shawn could remember, nobody had ever spoken like that to him. Certainly not his father. Not even his mother.
“I didn’t do much,” said a child, “and I wouldn’t have done even that if Karen didn’t catch the candle when I dropped it.”
Obviously Michael was talking to somebody else. It was business as usual.
“At least you stayed on my back,” said the boy. “I wish you didn’t have to pinch my feathers so hard, though.”
The other child giggled softly.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
Shawn slowly opened his eyes and this time he could take the light. Making sense out of what he was seeing was something else. A lit candle in the center of the room was easy enough to identify, but it took a bit longer for Shawn to realize that the candle was standing in a white flower. Windows filled with bright blue sky ringed the room. Next to him was Michael Bullinger, not the sort of person he wanted near him. Next to Michael was a girl. Sheila. The stuck up creature who took piano lessons from his aunt. When Shawn saw a wolf across the room laying on its side, licking its flanks and looking quite satisfied with itself, Shawn let out a little cry.
“He won’t hurt you,” Michael promised him.
“How do you know?” Shawn retorted.
“Have it your way if you’d rather be chewed up,” said Michael in return.
“Why did that guy try to shoot us?” asked Sheila.
“I don’t know,” Michael replied.
Shawn recalled hearing something like a gunshot from inside the bird’s beak. He shivered at the thought of what might have happened to him if the bird had been shot down while he was still trapped in its beak.
“Somebody got hit, didn’t he?” asked Sheila.
“Yea,” Michael answered. “Roger. A friend of mine. We’d better go down and see if he’s okay.”
“Michael doesn’t care about you,” said the older man in black to Shawn.
“He ignores you, after all you’ve been through,” said the woman.
“You had a part in what they accomplished,” said the younger man, “but they aren’t giving you any of the credit.”
Michael and Sheila both walked over to one of the windows and looked out.
“An ambulance is driving away,” said Sheila, “I guess he’s in that.”
“Those song boys look pretty worried, judging by the way they’re pacing around,” said Michael.
Curious, Shawn edged his way to the nearest window and looked down for himself. It looked like a pretty mixed-up world down there. A large sailing ship sporting a pirate flag dominated the scene, but a fountain spewing out colorful water caught his attention, too. An elephant was strolling among the people, among whom were men dressed like pirates and a man strutting about with a gold crown on his head. Cowboys riding unicorns, Shawn’s runaway toy men, also mingled with people in a friendly way. Then Shawn saw something that made him scowl and clench his fists. Right below him was his own battered train set as large as life with his caboose at the end.
“Look!” Sheila exclaimed. “The police and the medics are fighting over who’s going to take that man away.”
“Yea,” said Michael. “Those pirates nailed him pretty good. Still don’t recognize him.”
But Shawn did. A cry from the gut escaped from him.
“What’s the matter?” Michael asked.
“Never mind,” said Shawn, clamming up.
Michael shrugged and directed his attention back to the window. The realization that his own father had tried to shoot him put a clamp over every muscle in his body. Not knowing that he was inside that bird’s beak was no excuse. Not with that poor excuse of a Dad.
“It looks like somebody squeezed a whole different town into Milton,” Sheila remarked. “The store over there looks like the one where Kevin and I got the candle.”
For himself, Shawn recognized the tavern where he took Karen to dinner.
“I think that all of Carelin has merged into Milton,” said Michael.
“Is that a good thing?” asked Sheila.
Michael shrugged.
“Good for us. Probably not so good for Carelin, if you know what I mean.”
Something moving caught Shawn’s eye. The train was starting up to roll out of town. As it went, people were waving at Kevin from the windows..
“HEY!” Shawn cried out. “How dare they take my train away?”
Michael and Sheila gave Shawn a hard stare. The wolf growled softly.
“We told you they don’t care about you,” said the woman in black.
“Is keeping that the train to yourself all you care about after all we’ve been through?” Sheila asked Shawn angrily.
“They’ll hate you, no matter what you do,” said the older man.
“Cool it, Sheila,” said Michael. “Shawn had a rough ride and he is the one who lit the candle.”
“He did?” Sheila asked incredulously.
“He’d gotten turned into a little spark for being such a Superbrat,” Michael explained. “I should talk. I got turned into a big black crow for mouthing off like one. Then I got turned into that phoenix and those singing boys thought I was I was the greatest thing since pizza got invented. Won’t deserve that in a million years. Ended up carrying Superbrat in my beak. No fun for me. No fun for him. Good thing for all of us he didn’t burn me up. If it wasn’t for him, this world would still be as dark as spoiled black coffee. Time to give Superbrat a break and call him Shawn.”
“I—I’m sorry, Shawn,” said Sheila. “I wasn’t very cooperative either. I just got dragged along and made things worse.
Shawn could hardly believe his ears. He couldn’t bear to look at either Michael or Sheila just then.
“You know, Shawn,” said Michael, “I’ve never had much of anything, and I guess I’ve been jealous of people who do when I bother to think about out. I don’t know what it feels like to have something worth while and then lose it.”
For the first time in his life, Shawn tried to imagine trying to live without any of the toys and gadgets that had flooded his life. He panicked and drove the thought out of his mind.
“Doesn’t sound like a fun problem,” said Shawn.
“It isn’t,” said Michael.
Shawn watched the train move out of town, surprised that seeing it come to full life with real people in it almost made up for losing it as a toy.
“My parents must be terribly worried,” said Sheila.
“At least I don’t have that problem,” said Michael. “I want to go see how Roger’s doing. Are you coming, you lazy pup?”
The wolf grunted a clear affirmative, sprang to its feet and walked with Michael and Sheila to the ladder to the lower levels of the lighthouse.
“They care about that wolf more than they care about you,” said the younger man to Shawn.
“Come on, Shawn,” said Michael. “Come and meet some neat friends of mine. They can explain the stuff that happened to us better than I can. I bet they’ll make friends with you if you let them. They’ve always been nice to me and you can’t get any lower than that.”
“I bet I do,” said Shawn.
“I didn’t know you were that generous with your money,” said Michael.
Those words reminded Shawn of what Melanie the Web Spinner said to him about making a bet like that, he wanted to make. With no further hesitation, he followed Michael Bullinger and Sheila Armstrong down the ladder.
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“Can’t you leave a guy who’s in the hospital with a head concussion and a scalp wound in peace?” an exasperated Bill Harrison asked the police officer.
The police officer gave Bill a sharp frown. Agnes Shepherd, sitting by the hospital bed, rolled her eyes.
“Dr. Rosskill says that you’re just in here for observation, and you should be out sometime tomorrow,” the officer replied. “You look well enough to be accountable for your actions to me.”
“And I suppose the minute I’m out you’ll haul me off to the police station even if my head still feels like a hundred blacksmiths are pounding on me,” Bill shot back.
“I suggest that you show some concern that you almost put a bullet through a boy’s brain,” said the officer.
“It only grazed his skull,” said Bill, “so they can’t charge me with much. He wouldn’t have been hurt at all if he didn’t jump me the way he did. You should put him in jail for being a reckless kid.”
“Actually, the bullet missed the boy’s brain by only a few millimeters,” said the officer. “Dr. Rosskill was up half the night treating the injury and making sure that no neurological damage occurred.”
“The point is,” said an increasingly irritated Bill Harrison, “that the boy wasn’t killed or crippled.”
“Lucky for you as much as for him that he wasn’t. Why did you pull out a gun in the first place?”
“I was trying to kill that bird before it was too late.”
The officer shook his head in disgust. Agnes sat bolt upright in her chair and looked her brother hard in the eye.
“But—didn’t you realize that Sheila Armstrong, my best piano student, was riding on that bird’s back?” Agnes asked him. “If you had shot that bird, Sheila would have been killed, too.”
“Do you mean to tell me you think I have to watch out for crazy little girls who ride on the back of every bird that comes along?” Bill asked angrily.
“Bill, it is about time you took some responsibility for the things you do in life,” said Agnes.
“I’m just as responsible as the next guy,” Bill protested.
“If you really are as responsible as the next guy,” said the officer.
“Will you please just get out of here?” Bill ordered.
“Okay,” said the officer. “We will keep a guard on the hospital to make sure you don’t leave without authorization. I will send in a report to the county prosecutor’s office where I’m sure charges will be filed.”
Bill muttered a string of obscene names to the officer as he left and almost called his own son something he did not intend to call him when Shawn came in and presented his father with his typical sullen look.
“Well, thanks for coming to see your wounded father,” said Bill with wounding sarcasm.
“You’re welcome,” said Shawn. “I got here as soon as I could—considering.”
“Considering the fact that you’re a selfish, ego-centric, spoiled brat,” Bill replied.
Shawn shrugged his shoulders. A tall girl stepped in behind Shawn and gave Bill a sharp look.
“I am pleased to report that your son has acted generously in the cause of restoring the light to this world,” said the girl.
“Well, that’s a first,” said Bill drily.
“Sorry to disappoint you, Dad” said Shawn.
Bill opened his mouth to say that he wasn’t disappointed to learn that Shawn had acted generously, but before he got any words out, the frame of the doorway filled up with a boy seated in a wheelchair. His head was bandaged in the shape of a turban. A small girl wheeled him into the room. A couple who seemed to be the boy’s parents followed, and then a couple of scruffy teenagers, who looked as if they had just been taken off skid row brought up the rear of the unsettling procession. The girl rolled the boy close to the bed and the boy held out his hand.
“I’m Roger.”
“Are you the one who jumped me?” Bill asked him, keeping his arms firmly under the blankets.
“Yes,” said Roger.
“Are you expecting me to apologize for shooting you in the head when it’s your own fault you caught the bullet?”
All of the visitors stiffened.
“We thought you might want to thank Roger for preventing you from killing the phoenix,” said the older girl.
“If you did,” said the younger girl, “you would have kept the world dark forever and ever.”
“Can’t I even shoot one bird without somebody making a cosmic issue out of it?” Bill snapped.
The tension in the room doubled.
“This is a cosmic issue,” said the boy’s mother, her eyes as sharp as her voice.
“How was I supposed to know that this particular bird, out of all the birds in the world, was the one bird who just happened be bringing the light back to the world?” asked Bill.
“If a bird is needed to bring back the light,” said the scruffy blond boy, “then some particular bird has to do it.”
“What do you know about it?” Bill asked.
“I was the bird.”
“Tell me another one.”
The boy and Shawn exchanged glances.
“First, Michael got turned into a crow,” Shawn explained, “because he acted like one, and then he got turned into a phoenix so he could act like that. I got turned into a little spark because—I guess it’s because I thought I was a big shot when I wasn’t much more than a spark. The phoenix picked me up in his beak because I was being my obnoxious self. He needed the spark to light a candle and bring back the light, so he carried me until he got to the lighthouse, where the candle was. Since I was still in the phoenix’s beak when you aimed your gun at it, this is a personal matter. Roger risked his life to save mine. I’ve already promised to buy him the best train set any kid ever had.”
“And you can come over to my house any time and help me play with it,” said Roger to Shawn.
Bill felt that his whole world was collapsing.
“So, what are you going to do with me,” Bill asked, “burn me at the stake?”
“That’s no fun,” said the younger girl. “I think we should wrap you in a blanket of marshmallows and roast you over a fire until you never want to shoot a phoenix again.”
“Samantha!” her mother reproved her.
“We have to do something, don’t we?” Samantha replied.
“I’d rather roast marshmallows than roast you,” said Roger to Bill. “I just don’t want anybody else to have to jump you and get shot in the head to keep you from shooting a phoenix.”
“All right, I promise never to shoot another phoenix in my life,” said Bill. “Will that do?”
“For now,” said Roger’s mother as the older girl wheeled her brother out of the room.
“See you, Dad,” said Shawn as he started to follow the rest out into the hallway.
“Are you going to leave he here all alone?” asked Bill.
“I’ve been invited out by my friends,” Shawn replied. “If you’re out tomorrow, maybe you can join us then.”
“What do you mean, maybe?”
“That’s up to you. See you.”
“You’re right,” said the older man, “the whole world’s against you.”
“Even your own son has turned against you,” said the woman.
“You’re going to have to whip that boy back into shape,” said the younger man.
“That’s for sure,” Bill muttered under his breath.
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“What’s the matter, boss?” asked the security guard at the door of City Hall.
“I’ve just been fired, that’s all,” Everett McAlister replied, spitting out each syllable, “after all I did to hold the town together.”
“The mayor didn’t appreciate it?”
“He appreciated my work enough to give me a generous early retirement package. If that’s appreciation than the electric chair is a reward for honorary service to the city. He said I’m too stressed out to stay on the job.”
“Well, you did get a bit hot under the collar,” said the security guard.
“I was just doing my job!” Everett yelled so loudly that the guard had to clap his hands over his ears.
Everett stomped out of the City Hall and tried to get his bearings.
“Now I don’t even know my way around my own town,” he grumbled to himself as he picked his way down Main Street. “I’ll never get used to having that toy store next to Carl’s Hardware.”
Everett made a face when he saw a group of cowboys, their unicorns tied to a post beside them, replacing the broken shop window. Inside his store, Carl was talking happily with a couple of strangers from the crazy town who were amazed to learn that there were such things as power tools. Inside the toy store, a horde of children were cleaning up the mess they had made, and they didn’t even have that bossy girl standing over them to make them do it. Several children were crawling all over the pirate ship, playing pirates, and other children were blowing colorful bubbles at the fountain.
“Half of those children are intruders,” said the older man in Everett’s ear.
“The people from this other kingdom will change the town of Milton beyond recognition,” said the woman.
The sight of Donna’s Donuts in roughly its original place was reassuring to Everett. More reassuring to him was the group of tough-looking youths standing outside an intimidating any crazy foreign people who tried to enter. Everett decided he needed some coffee and a donut real bad.
“You should run for mayor on a platform to return the town to its rightful citizens,” suggested the older man.
“We can put you in touch with a man who can fund your campaign,” said the woman.
“Hmm,” Everett grunted. “Maybe I’ll do that. That’ll fix Ted’s wagon.”